12th South Carolina volunteer infantry, The

The 12th South Carolina served in the Army of Northern Virginia from April 1862 to April 1865.

Port Royal, November 7, 1861, opened action for the 12th South Carolina Volunteer Infantry, with four companies there supporting Confederate guns at Fort Walker and six companies at Fort Beauregard, faced off in a forlorn long range gunnery contest against the invincible Federal fleet. Following service on the South Carolina coast with the 13th and 14th South Carolina Infantry Regiments, the regiment, along with the other two, was ordered to Virginia in April, 1862.

There the 12th was attached for the war in the Maxcy Gregg/Samuel McGowan Brigade, which was made of the Ist (Gregg's), 1st (Orr's South Carolina Rifles), 12th, 13th, and 14th South Carolina Infantry Regiments. The brigade was part of A.P. Hill's Light Division.

The 12th participated in all the glories and agonies of the Army of Northern Virginia from the Seven Days to Five Forks. Etched into the history of the regiment, upon the end of the ball at Appomattox, were at least 560 deaths, including the loss of one of these three featured regimental officers.

The History of a Brigade of South Carolinians

by J. EJ. Caldwell, 1st South Carolina, 1866

"In response to a call from President Davis, about the 1st of July, 1861, a large number of infantry companies, from all quarters of South Carolina, rendezvoused at Columbia, South Carolina. Here they were placed in a camp of instruction, at Lightwoodknot Springs, about five miles from Columbia, and allowed to arrange themselves in regiments of ten companies and elect field-officers. The first regiment so formed was numbered the Twelfth South Carolina volunteers, and elected the following officers: R.G.M. Dunnovant, Colonel; Dixon Barnes, Lieutenant-Colonel; Cadwallader Jones, Major. In the autumn this regiment was ordered to the coast, where it was present at the well-known bombardment of Hilton Head by the United States fleet. There being no engagement, except with artillery, the regiment could scarcely be said to participate. On the evacuation of the position it was successfully withdrawn, after pretty muddy wading, they tell me, to the mainland. It was next stationed near Green Point, near the line of Colleton and Beaufort, at which time it, with the Thirteenth and Fourteenth regiments, was placed under command of Brig. Gen. Gregg."

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